Me, being an atheist with an open mind to philosophy has asked this question in my spare time on several different occasions. It's a big mystery to me how suddenly the Mayan cities had just turned into ghost towns. Don't you find it interesting as well? Common theory that I found through textbooks at my school lead me to beleive that it was the soil that became less fertile, due to fires and erosion or a riot from farmers. However, I somehow doubt that's the case.
Seeing as I'm extremely superstitious, here's my theory, call it stupid or what you will, just say why you think it's stupid:
Well, the Mayan Civilization was a Theocracy, which is a civilization ruled by religious leaders. Like high priests and whatnot. So from that I think that they learned too much, which is where a few other ideas come into the theory. Their calender, yes, stops on 2012. Since I could find no time of when the calendar was finished, I'll continue. I beleive that the theocracies gods punished the Mayans for finding the ending of time. This is just a crackpot supernatural theory though that includes only a dabble of logic to piece these things together. But this is my current opinion should it be relating to philosophy in any way.
My more "believable" idea is a full on full out riot against the theocracy for a reason not known to us. I remember seeing a theory of a massacre in the several different cities on the History channel. I think that for some reason, the theocracy caused a riot, and the people became uncontrollable and killed each other during the heat.
So what's your opinions? And why do YOU think the Mayans disappeared?
The golden age of the Mayans ended around 900 AD. But they still had their own city-states and political units. It was the conquistadors who ended them. The Mayans put up a fierce resistance. But the Spanish were no match for them.
lol I think you accidently made a mistype, they were definately a match, they had the speed and agility but technologicly in warfare they had no help at all, cloth and obsidian vs powder and plate, clearly they'd lose but it doesn't mean to say they were no match, they repelled the first invasion but the second time in force ended them, Cortez from the first one pretended to be their god, one that didn't return until then...
You call yourself an atheist and then blame 'gods'? That doesn't really make any sense. And then to go back on it & call your own theory 'crackpot' seems a little strange.
excuse me, I'm just tryign to see it through the common person's eye as well as my own. That forms a less one sided or useless debate, doesn't it? Plus, an athiest just means that I beleive there is no god, however, I have an open mind and can see things by a common mans eye. I call it a hypothetical, you should use them.
And also, you have to make your question more clear. Do you mean the Mayan race, or the Mayan Empire.
Both, actuallly. If I said just the mayan people, then people would come in here and start yelling "BUT THEY LIVED THROUGH THE AZTECS, STUPID" :P.
Well in Australia alot of the Aborigines died because the English brought sicknesses into their society tat they had never dealt with before. Alot of them died. So going by that I reckon it was probably illness brought with the spanish and war.
My idea is that the competeing civilizations went to war with each other becuase they both needed the same assets and the Mayas were the losers so the other civilization killed them all
That isn't bad as a theory actually, I was reading up on South American Natives and it was a fairly normal custom to torture EVERYBODY to death if you caputered them in battle. So I suppose if an invading force was set on their cities they would finish every last person they found.
excuse me, I'm just tryign to see it through the common person's eye as well as my own. That forms a less one sided or useless debate, doesn't it?
It's a strange debate. Normally a person has a single point of view and they argue that. If a debate is one-sided it's because one person with an opinion is dominating the other opinions in a debate. If you have several different points of view... what are you arguing? Bashing your own point of view in your own post isn't going to win you any blue ribbons. If you don't have any respect for it, how do you expect anyone else to?
Plus, an athiest just means that I beleive there is no god, however, I have an open mind and can see things by a common mans eye. I call it a hypothetical, you should use them.
I was aware what an atheist is, thanks. This still doesn't make any sense. Making a hypothesis about gods, while not believing in them.. I'm just lost for words.
I'm certainly not going to hypothesise in the manner that you do. That's like me saying:
"Hey, I don't believe in gods, but Hephaestus is the reason why global warming is happening; he's running his forge a little too hot."
It's a strange debate. Normally a person has a single point of view and they argue that. If a debate is one-sided it's because one person with an opinion is dominating the other opinions in a debate. If you have several different points of view... what are you arguing? Bashing your own point of view in your own post isn't going to win you any blue ribbons. If you don't have any respect for it, how do you expect anyone else to?
It's actually being more resourceful - He's using different views to counter anything he might've said, countering it back it'll back on to eachother until the debait is settled, for instance if I had to die to save someone else here's how I'd think: Self: You have no responsibility to save this persons life, though you should try to split an even side, you have to pick yourself first... Selfless: You have no right to judge the value of this mans life, you should only allow yourself death or try to find an alternative for the two of you Aggressive: Try to solve this with the threateners life, try to make sure you intimidate him to make it take longer for anything to happen, giving you the chance to strike, of course if your restrained then you should try to stall him... Defensive: Try to stall the enemy, going off-topic to make sure he drifts off, slowly coming back to the point, if it doesn't work then you have to do one simple thing, stall him in the Aggressive's view Thoughtful: Well, you know that this man has chosen YOU to choose, possibly a trick, try to make the other talk, look at him, listen to him and how he speaks, get to know how he acts and decide from that, there's no point in stalling depending on the area, and what you was doing before, try to think from every side....
Now, really I would think of my immediate view and tackle it, using as much arguements possible they'll tackle eachother constantly, making one ultimate decision - Hard to decide I know, but think about it
